The final tally stands at nearly 27 mooncakes – 12 made with pure lotus paste, 10 with mixed nuts & lotus paste surrounded by pandan flavoured lotus paste and 5 made with pandan lotus paste. The mixed nuts mooncake was a play on the traditional salted egg yolk centre mooncakes. I just mixed a handful of walnuts, chopped almonds and pumpkin seeds with the remaining lotus paste and shaped them into balls weight 25 gms. To mimic the outer filling (traditionally lotus paste), I used pandan lotus paste instead and utilised about 50-55 gms of the stuff.

As you can see, the nut-centred mooncake looks pretty decent except for the tiny pockets of air. That portion – the kneading and enveloping of the outer filling requires more work. I haven’t tried this but my hubby and his colleague have tried the lotus paste mooncake and find the filling to be just nice, skin isn’t too thick but because it hasn’t matured (mooncakes need at least 24-48 hours to soften and mature), the skin is a bit tad on the hard side. I’ll have to wait and see if that is the case even after maturing as I encountered some issues with the recipe (I found it to be a bit tad too fluid and tacky so I added in about another 50 gms of flour or so). Hm.

In a large bowl, mix the golden syrup, alkaline water and oil well before adding in the flour. Use a spatula to combine all ingredients before kneading into a dough. Do not overknead or over-stir. Cover and set aside to rest for at least 45 minutes or overnight if possible.

Preheat the oven at 180 C for at least 30 minutes. This is crucial in ensuring a nicely baked crust.

Divide the dough into 20 gm balls (remember to keep your hands and fingers dusted with flour). Depending on your filling and how it’s structured (just filling & skin or two different fillings & skin), wrap the skin around the filling. If you have two fillings (egg yolk/nuts/filling surrounded by another filling), wrap the center portion with the filling before you wrap it with the dough. Roll the finished product into a nice ball.

Dust the ball lightly with flour and placed the stuffed mooncake into the mould. Lightly press down onto the pan and gently remove the mould. Repeat until all the filling & dough is finished.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 5 minutes. Remove and allow the mooncakes to cool for 15 minutes before brushing them with egg wash. Continue to bake until the pastry turns golden brown (about 10-12 minutes). Remove and cool on a wire rack before storing in an air tight container.

Allow the mooncake to sit and mature for at least 24-48 hours before serving. To store, keep these in an airtight container in the fridge.

This was a last minute bake in an attempt to clear out the fridge and I did this prior to the move back to Malaysia. Due to all the hoohah and craziness of moving itself, finding an apartment here in M’sia and what-not, the entry never made the light of day till now. Between then till now, I have forgotten many things except that the kids (and hubby) enjoyed this and that it was just right.

Preheat your oven at 160 C and prepare a loaf or square pan of your choice.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour and baking powder before setting aside.

In a separate bowl, add the zest to the sugar and rub in before setting aside. Beat the butter and cream cheese until they are evenly mixed before adding in the sugar and zest mix. Beat until creamy and smooth.

Add in the egg, one at a time, before adding in the vanilla extract. Mix well.

Once ready, add in the flour, poppyseed, chopped almonds and dessicated coconut before folding in until the flour is just incorporated (it’s okay if the mixture is lumpy or looks floury)

When ready, pour into the prepared pan and bake for 45 to 60 mins. Test with a skewer for doneness – a skewer inserted in the center should come out clean, or with just a few crumbs.

Remove from the oven to cool in the pan and enjoy as is or with a cup of tea. Great for kids too!

Moving makes life miserable because you find yourself cooking up all sorts of things just to finish off that little bit of rice, dried goods or whatever else you have in the pantry. This time, it’s that small amount of arborio rice and a small box of sundried tomatoes. I didn’t really follow a recipe for this – just whipped it up based on what little I knew about risotto. I am familiar with making a basic risotto – onions, rice, white wine and stock. After that, it all depends on what you’d like to “flavour” it with.

This recipe is quite versatile, packed with flavour and suitable for kids & vegetarians. If you want to go even further and make it a vegan dish, skip on the butter and pork belly. For an added kick, you can add other varieties of mushrooms – shitaki, oyster, whatever rocks your both. You can even adapt it by omitting the tomato & mushroom combo, and replace it with zucchini, eggplant, pumpkin, broccoli, pea, seafood, prawns, ham…whatever you want, really.

Before you start cooking, soak the tomatoes in a pot of warm water until they are soft – I took about 30 minutes. Remove, chop into rough bits and place aside. Keep the water used for soaking the tomatoes – it will end up as part of the stock. In a pot, bring the beef (and tomato) stock (or water + beef stock cube) to a gentle simmer.

In another pot, saute the diced onions and smoked pork belly (optional) in the butter and oil on a medium-high fire until soft but not brown. Add in the rice and stir until the grains are translucent. Add in the white wine and stir.

Gradually add in the beef stock while stirring constantly. Add in the mushrooms and chopped sundried tomatoes. Continue to stir. Keep the mixture simmering and add more beef stock when necessary. The rice will absorb the stock as it cooks.

Cook for 20 minutes or until the rice has absorbed all the stock.

Remove from the heat, and add in the cheese as well as salt & pepper to taste. Mix well and serve immediately.

This recipe wasn’t actually on my to-do list. A few days ago, I purchased some non-treated navel oranges on the stem with the intention of making a true orange pound cake. Then last night, I caught a very big baking bug and on whim, right after dinner, decided to bake up a yummy pound cake. Unfortunately, I was down just one egg so that required some google work and found Tutti Dolci’s recipe. I must admit that I was a bit skeptical at the idea of just 1 egg in a pound cake but decided to give it a try anyway.

I used Greek yogurt and skimmed milk as well as orange juice to keep it a stronger orange flavour. In place of regular sugar, I decided to try out this stevia and brown sugar blend which is supposed to be healthier and stronger in sweetness (you use only half of the amount of regular sugar called for in recipes). I also skipped the glaze because I didn’t want anything overly sweet for the kids and luckily too. I think with the glaze, the cake would be a bit tad on the sweet side.

The cake is not as rich as a typical pound cake but it is still strong in flavour. I find that the yogurt keeps the cake moist and less crumbly. Overall, this makes for a nice breakfast item or a tea treat. I’m tempted to make this again but with some chocolate chips or almond slivers.

Sift the flour, baking power, baking soda into a bowl and set aside. In another bowl, mix the orange juice, Greek yogurt and milk well and set aside.

Add the zest to the sugar and mix well before adding in the softened butter. Mix together until light and fluffy before adding in the egg and vanilla extract. Stir well.

Add half of the yogurt-milk-juice mix and stir well before adding in half of the flour mix. Stir well before adding in the other half of the yogurt-milk-juice mix and finish off with the flour mix. Fold in gently.

Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top with a spatula. Bake for 35-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and cake springs back to the touch.

Cool in pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes; carefully remove cake from pan and cool completely on wire rack.

For a first try, this wasn’t too bad or so the hubby said. The curd has a lovely lime flavour that isn’t too sweet or tart. The meringue was fluffy, airy and had that “melt in your mouth” texture without coming across as chewy or gummy. The proportion of meringue to curd, more importantly, were just right. I did experience some issues with the curd not setting properly – David’s recipe called for a 10-minute bake but I reckon I’ll extend it further by another 5-10 minutes as mine didn’t really set that well. One thing to note too is that this tart definitely holds up better when it’s fully chilled. Cutting it when it’s still warm – even a little – will result in a very gooey mess.

I also experienced a little bit of beading on the top of my meringue – you can see a bead or two on top of the meringue in the picture above – and I read that this is due to either overbaking or humidity. While I can’t control the latter, I can definitely control the former. And that would be to baking the meringue at a very high temperature – above 200 C – for a short amount of time. Some people suggested adding a tiny bit of cornstarch to the egg white mix to help absorb excess batter and prevent overbeating. I might give both a try.

While the hubs down three slices – two in one go and shared his third with Eva – Noah didn’t seem to be a very big fan of the tarty flavours. After one lick of the curd, he decided that a lime tart wasn’t on his “to experience” list – too, well, tart!

Sift the flour into a bowl before adding in the sugar and cubing the butter into the flour mix.
Rub the butter with the flour, using your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Make a well in the center, add the water. Mix well until it forms a dough – add more cold water if necessary.

When ready, remove from the fridge and roll out before covering the tart/pie pan. Remove excess dough from the top/sides, prick some holes in the base before pouring in the baking beans. Bake for 15 minutes or until the pastry is set. Remove the pastry shell from the oven, put aside

While the pastry is baking, preparing the curd by warming the butter, lime juice, sugar, zest, and salt in a medium sized saucepan/pot over low heat.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs and the yolks.

Once the butter has melted, pour some of the warm lime juice mixture into the eggs while whisking constantly to temper the mixture. Pour the warmed eggs back into the saucepan (lime juice mix) and cook over low heat while whisking constantly. Cook the mixture – do not stop stirring – over low heat until the filling thickens and coats the back of the spoon (it should resemble soft jiggly jelly!). Do not let it boil.

Remove and pour the curd into the baked tart shell. Jiggle a little to even the curd out and bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until the curd has set.

While the tart is baking, start working on the meringue. Add the cream of tartar to the egg whites and whisk until foamy before gradually adding in the sugar – take your time. Do not dump all the sugar at once; this will result in clumps and lumps forming.

Beat your egg whites until they resemble stiff peaks (you can lift the whisk and the egg whites will hold its own shape OR place the bowl over your head – if you don’t have a mess on your hair, you’re good to go!).

Once done, using a spoon, place dollops of the meringue over the entire surface of the hot lemon curd, starting at the outside edge of the tart. Make sure the meringue comes right up to the crust and there are no gaps between the crust and the lemon curd to prevent “weeping”. With the back of your spoon, gently press down on the meringue to get rid of any air pockets and to make sure all the lemon curd is covered with the meringue. You can choose to make some decorative swirls, if you like or just leave it as it is.

Brown the top of the meringue using a broiler, flame torch or top grill of the oven. Once the top begins to darken, remove the tart from the oven and cool completely before slicing.

NOTE: Tarts are best eaten on the same day that they are made. If you want, you can store leftovers covered in the fridge.

After some weeks of monitoring my calorie intake, I decided to indulge a little plus I needed to use up some pantry goods, especially my whole wheat flour and dark chocolate. Initially I wanted to whip up a banana brownie but since the kids are going through a “crazy about peanut butter” phase, I decided to try out a new recipe. It took about 25 minutes to whip everything up and I did it while the kids were taking their evening bath/going through their wind-down activity. By the time Eva came out of the bathroom, the brownie was in the oven baking away and she settled on licking the spatula. Tehehehe.

There is something sinful about the salty crunch of the peanut in the peanut butter topped off with some amazing chocolate goodness. Eva enjoyed her 1.5 slices and Noah? He actually protested when I took my time feeding him the cake! This brownie came out a little cakey so if you like yours fudgy and chewy, bake it for only 30-35 minutes tops.

In a separate bowl, melt the butter and chocolate in a bain marie. Once done, set aside to cool.

In a mixing bowl, add the whole wheat flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. Mix well before adding in the eggs, vanilla extract and the melted chocolate mix. Fold gently by hand until well incorporated.

Pour into a pan and set aside. Mix the ingredients for (B) in a bowl until they are well-incorporated. Pour over the brownie batter and swirl in. Take care not to overswirl – you may lose the contrast of the light brown and dark brown colours.

Bake for 45 mins. Once ready, remove from the oven and cool in the pan completely before slicing the brownies. Enjoy on its own or with a scoop of vanilla ice cream!

For as long as I could remember, I could never find laksa noodles for my homemade Penang asam laksa. I can find kuey teow or flat rice noodles, beehoon or vermicelli, tang hoon or mung bean noodles, a wide range of egg-based noodles but never laksa noodles. Heck, even soba and udon is easy to find.

So after some hunting around at my favourite Asian grocery store – Paris Store (there are no Asian shops here in Dole so I go to Paris Store in Lyon whenever I visit my mother-in-law) – I decided to take the plunge and make my own laksa noodles. The store stocked bags of Vietnamese flour mixes for all kinds of things and after looking at the packaging, I decided to try out the one that read “Rice Spaghetti” since it looked pretty much like a bowl of laksa.

It’s pretty much straight forward and reminded me of making glutinous rice balls. You basically cook one-third of the flour mix in some water until it thickens like glue. The remainder of the flour mix is mixed in with some more water. Once the “glue” is ready, it goes into the flour mix and here is when you get to exercise your muscles and mix everything until it resembles a semi-fluid glue mix. I had to add more water to get it down to the right consistency – somewhat like pancake batter. When that is right, pour some into a pipping bag and pipe some long strands into boiling water. They’ll float when ready and after that, just scoop up the floating noodles, toss them into cold water for a minute or two before you drain and set them aside.

When I first made these noodles, I made a rather watery batter and I wasn’t exactly organised. So it required two people – one to pipe the noodles and another to fish them out. Took me three tries to get everything to the right consistency, timing and cooking structure. In fact, my most recent attempt today saw me doing everything alone. From start to finish, it took less than 45 minutes. The result was approximately 1 to 1.5 kg of lovely springy freshly made noodles!

In the quest of losing weight the healthy way, I have started to cut back on my diet, revamp my eating habits and regular exercise. The weight loss has been very slow – about 500 gms to 1 kg in three weeks – because I was still eating rather well. So I decided to get a little serious by doing some calorie counting. After just two days of counting calories, I must say that people really do overeat in terms of portions and the food itself. I found myself watching my portions when I cook and trying to stick within the 1200-calories-a-day limit with some success. It really isn’t all that difficult. The key is in finding substitutes and yes, portion control.

Since I have been developing a sweet tooth of lately – no thanks to my diet which has had me being restricted to no desserts and just fruits – I decided to find a low fat banana cake. I modified my own banana-based recipes with the general guidelines of substitution – applesauce for oil and whole wheat instead of bleached white flour. I wasn’t too sure how a 100% whole wheat cake would go down so I opted for the 50-50 approach.

The result is a approximately 130 calorie slice of banana cake – each slice is about 1 cm thick and oh so moist & delish! Noah loved it and kept crawling around the dining table as I was slicing the loaf up, begging for more – he got the crumbs because it was past his breakfast time and I don’t like the kids to eat continously all day long. I’ll give him half a slice for his snack later. I reckon this would go down quite well for breakfast – one or two slices would still leave me a good window for the remainder of the day plus the whole wheat element will keep me fuller.

NOTE: If you’re after a richer indulgence, you can replace the applesauce with melted butter (or vegetable oil if you don’t want to live that dangerously). But that means a higher calorie count! Tehehehe.